


'Til All Are One

by crane_wings



Category: StarCraft, Transformers - All Media Types
Genre: Dark, Gen, Hive Mind, Mild Gore, Non-Consensual Body Modification, Psychological Horror, assimilation into hive mind, crossover fic, it's not a nice fic, loss of self
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-12
Updated: 2015-03-12
Packaged: 2018-03-17 13:25:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,766
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3530984
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/crane_wings/pseuds/crane_wings
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Zerg seek to overcome their organic boundaries, and an unfortunate Cybertronian falls right into their claws.</p>
<p>A Transformers/Starcraft x-over where the Zerg exist in the TF universe and the Cybertronians are so busy with the civil war that they don’t notice that the Zerg are now looking in their direction.</p>
            </blockquote>





	'Til All Are One

**Author's Note:**

> For those who don’t know anything about Starcraft, there are just a few basic things you need to know about the Zerg.
> 
> They’re insect-like aliens striving for genetic perfection. They find different species that have desirable traits, such as resistance to freezing temperatures. They hunt down members of that species, kill and eat them, then assimilate the new genetic material into their own DNA code. They then insta-evolve and voila, Zerg resistant to freezing temps. The Zerg can infest any living organism and occasionally even inorganic things like a building or two.
> 
> They have a hive mind and a telepathic hierarchy. Broods are subgroups within the Swarm. The undisputed head honcho is the Overmind, the only one telepathically strong enough to control the whole Swarm.
> 
> Also, they kind of leave death and destruction everywhere they go. It’s part of why the Zerg are my favorite. They’re like a huge “Fuck You” to the universe.
> 
> Ok, I’ll stop typing now.

He can feel it, foreign invaders crawling around his plating and searching for an entrance. He instinctively tries to tighten the armor around his protoform, but the damage he received from before leaves openings.

They take advantage and creep inside, attaching to his protoform. It feels wrong, disgusting.

He wants to expel them from his frame, but he doesn’t know how. He can’t even move.

As he unwillingly drifts back into stasis, he remembers fighting.

-x-x-

After the ship crash landed on the organic planet, he and his crew were forced to battle with strange insectoid organics while the engineers tried to fix whatever had gone wrong with the engines.

Those things came creeping out from the thick surrounding forests. A small group at first, perhaps a scouting party of some sort, they figured after they killed the aggressive organics and a much larger group appeared less than a third of a joor later.

A mass of relatively small insectoids, like the ones they killed earlier, rushed them. Judging by the long sickle-like appendages and the fact that they were uncaringly charging headlong into blaster fire, they were probably melee fighters. The blaster shots easily penetrated their armor, which gave him and his crew a good advantage, but the strange creatures didn’t seem to care if they died. If one fell, another would just step on the body and continue to fight.

The battle ended quickly.

Then another group appeared.

This one wasn’t as easy to defeat. A new kind of insect-like organic appeared, spitting jagged spines from a distance with enough force to pierce through Cybertronian armor.

The new ones were also much tougher, needing more than just one shot to be killed.

Then another group came.

Like a wave, he thought. They would most likely keep coming, one right after another, until the enemy was overrun.

Terrified, he made a decision.

He turned his back to the static-filled screams of his comrades and the wet snarls and the horrible sound of tearing metal, and he ran like a worthless coward, barely acknowledging the lone insectoid that splintered off from the main group to give chase.

-x-x-

Something is wrong. Something in him is beginning to change, but he doesn’t know what. He just feels…off. Then he hears it.

_//Careful. Time is no matter. Only results.//_

Somehow he hears a voice, but he knows his audials are offline. The not-voice doesn’t say anything else, and he convinces himself he is imagining things now. He would much rather it be his imagination.

He sinks back into recharge and remembers running, hunger and death snapping at his pedes.

-x-x-

The thick forest he fled into was too dense and uneven for him to take alt mode. Running in root mode was much faster. After nearly a joor of running and calculating, he even had everything timed to the second decimal place.

If he ran at top speed for 5.23 breems after losing sight and sound of the thing, he would have 9.57 breems to rest and prepare for the next evasive run before it came within spine-spitting range.

The thing chasing him was slow but relentless.

He was 1.31 breems into another run when he noticed that he was no longer running on a carpet of dead vegetation, but the thing was still too close behind for him to stop and investigate. Just 3.09 breems, he thought to himself.

-x-x-

He loses track of time, maybe he’s lost it long ago.

His protoform is different. He doesn’t how it is different, just that it doesn’t feel like it belongs to him anymore.

As far as he can tell with his severely limited senses, the only things that haven’t changed are his spark and brain module. Everything else feels wrong, unnatural.

He wants to scream and struggle, but there is no physical response to his mental commands. His spark pulses frantically from the stress of helplessness.

_//Patience.//_

Inwardly, he cringes from the not-voice, and for the first time in a long time, he begins to pray to Primus.

-x-x-

He stopped when his internal timer finished counting down, venting harshly to cool his overworked frame.

9.57 breems to investigate and rest.

He warily stared down at the purple ground. Where he had been running atop dead and rotting vegetation before, he was now on top of some strange purple carpet. He slowly lifted a pede and grimaced at the string of thick viscous fluid that followed.

Great, it was slimy and gross.

How in the Pit had he not slipped in this stuff?

Looking around, he suddenly realized the disgusting purple carpet spread out as far as his optics could see. It probably wasn’t a good sign.

8.04 breems left.

With great reluctance, he carefully knelt down and cautiously placed his hand on the slimy carpet. Gross was the first thing that came to mind. Then he felt it. A light, barely-there beat.

Frowning in confusion, he pressed his hand more firmly against the ground.

There. A beat, and another, and another. Perfectly spaced apart. A beat per astrosecond. Like the steady pulse of a spark. And, he understood.

Ripping his hand away from the ground, he stumbled to his feet and frantically looked around.

It was _alive_. The fragging carpet was _alive_. He’d been _running_ _on_ something with a living pulse.

He fought back a gag, knowing he didn’t have any fuel left in his tank to purge.

There had to be an end to the carpeted area. If he ran horizontal to the direction he came from, he could then turn and go back to the terrain from before with the rotting vegetation while evading the insect thing at the same time.

A harsh growl grated on his audials and he tensed in horror.

That can’t be right. He still had 4.46 breems left!

Nevertheless, the thing came into view.

He ran and it followed.

-x-x-

 He prays for Primus to save him, to have mercy on his spark.

_//Let me in.//_

He isn’t sure what’s real and what’s not anymore. He has been praying for what feels like an eternity, but there’s no answer from Primus. Only the not-voice.

Something brushes against his spark chamber, but it doesn’t feel like a physical touch.

_//Let me in.//_

Maybe…maybe Primus _has_ been answering him. Maybe He has been trying to communicate for a long time now through the voice that wasn’t a voice.

What if Primus has been trying to save him but he had been too afraid to let Him in?

_//Let me in.//_

He remembers Cybertron as it was before the Great War, glittering gold under distant Hadeen’s soft morning light. He thinks of old friends and of barhopping and laughing away the nights with engex warm and heavy in his tank.

He wants to go home.

_//Let me in, my child, my creation.//_

And he does.

-x-x-

He ran as fast as his pedes could take him, and the thing started falling behind. Something still wasn’t right though. That thing was now moving at a much faster pace than before. If his hurried calculations were correct, its speed had increased by about thirty percent.

Had it been _playing_ all this time? Dragging out the hunt for a more satisfying kill?

A sharp pain suddenly lanced through his right leg and he stumbled, grabbing onto the closest branch to keep upright. Looking down, he choked back a sob when he saw the tip of a jagged spine protruding from the front of his leg.

The thing was at least half a kilometer behind him, yet it had been able to launch the spine with enough speed and force to completely run his leg through.

It _had_ been playing with him. There was no doubt about it now. The thing had gotten much closer to him earlier without doing anything. So, why now?

-x-x-

His spark is different. The only thing that remains is his brain module.

What had once been foreign invaders aren’t foreign anymore. Now, his Cybertronian mind is the foreign contaminant.

His mind is still his but not for long. He can already feel the changes latching on, altering his thought processes.

For an unknown time, he drifts in a haze of disjointed thoughts, lost and isolated from…from…

He doesn’t know what he is searching for. He just knows he shouldn’t be alone because being alone feels wrong on the most basic of levels. He needs to be _connected_ , part of the whole.

He reaches out, grasping desperately for a mental connection, _any_ connection.

_There!_

He latches on and is swept up into the collective stream of consciousness. There is no _he_ here, only _they_.

_attack-protect-tear-bite-rend-claw-burrow-ambush-slaughter-destroy-consume-assimilate-evolve_

A large overwhelming presence suddenly appears. No, it has always been there, it just hasn’t paid attention until now. The presence wraps itself around him and gently but firmly nudges him out of the thought stream.

_//Not yet.//_

He whines and struggles to escape, to return to the collective. That is where he belongs, he knows this in his very _spark_.

_//It is too early for you to fully merge with the Hive mind. To merge now is to lose your_ _individuality, which you will need to effectively lead your Brood.//_

The presence forms a barrier between him and the collective mind. He can still feel them through the barrier but heavily muted, and he throws himself at the obstacle in the hopes it would fall.

_//Patience, my creation. Your time will come but not yet.//_

He reluctantly backs off when the presence nudges him away from the mental barrier.

_//Your time will come.//_

He takes comfort in the presence of his master. The Overmind has no need to lie. His time will come.

-x-x-

He released the branch and limped forward, dragging his now useless leg behind. The spine had severed most of the important cables. Red warnings flashed in his HUD, but only one caught his attention.

_Initiating emergency stasis._

He’d been over-stressing his body on a near empty tank for a while now. Combined with the energon loss from the new wound, his frame couldn’t handle anymore. It was over. This was as far as he could go.

His left leg gave out and he fell to his knees.

After a klik, the thing entered his range of vision, circling around him to get in front. Where before it dragged its serpentine bulk across the ground, it now seemed to glide over the living carpet.

Everything finally clicked in his mind.

It hadn’t been playing. It had been _herding_ , staying close enough to keep him moving and letting him run straight into its territory.

The thing growled and clicked its mandibles together, seeming to tower over him though it was smaller. He had thought it ugly before from a distance, but this close up, it was hideous.

Drool leaked from the maw full of razor sharp teeth. That was the last thing he saw before the emergency stasis protocols activated.

-x-x-

_//It is time. Awaken, my creation, and embrace the glory of the Swarm.//_

The Overmind’s voice pulls him from his dreams, and for the first time in centuries, he moves. It is time to emerge and serve his master. His hands reach out, groping around the thick fluid he is suspended in until he finds a barrier. He instinctively knows what he needs to do and begins to claw at the wall of the chrysalis.

It takes less than a breem for him to tear through the carapace and slump down onto the ground, viscous fluid flowing out around him. He blindly pushes himself up into a kneeling position, combing through long unused coding to find the one to online his optics.

The first thing he sees is a drooling maw full of razor sharp teeth.

But, he is not afraid.

He knows this creature – _hydralisk-hunter-protector-servant-Brood-Swarm-mine_ – and he reaches out to stroke a mandible even as it bends down closer in answer to his unspoken demand.

How had he ever thought this creature ugly? From the long serpentine body built for powerful strikes to the tri-bladed scythes and sharp projectile spines, the hydralisk is death and destruction in its most primal form, and one of the most beautiful things he has ever seen.

“And, you’re mine,” he whispers, his vocal processor spitting static from damage and long disuse.

The hydralisk leans into his touch and softly chirrs it agreement.

Beautiful, indeed, but not perfect.

He looks down at his own frame and notes the imperfections. His old metal armor is cracked and broken open in multiple places, chitin armor and some infested protoform peeking out from gaps both large and small. All the kibble is gone from his frame, stripped away during the infestation process. He doesn’t even know if he has an alt mode, much less whether he can transform.

But, these are simple matters.

His new techno-organic form may have some flaws, but those can be solved by killing and assimilating the essence of other techno-organic or even pure mechanical species.

The hard work has already been done by the Overmind. His once pure Cybertronian CNA has been painstakingly spliced with Zerg DNA over the course of the centuries he spent incubating within the chrysalis.

The actual problem they face is assimilating non-organic essence into the Swarm’s genetic code. There exists too large a gap between DNA and CNA for the Zerg to properly evolve, and the process of infesting a mechanical being took too long to be a pragmatic option. They need a stepping stone, something to bridge the gap between organic and non-organic species.

Fortunately enough, he knows of the perfect choice.

The Quintessons of the planet Quintessa, techno-organics with _sparks_. Finding the planet should be easy enough and killing them even easier, but not yet.

He is not ready to risk the dangers of space travel, and neither is his Brood. He needs some time to get accustomed to his new form.

Lowering his mental barrier, he eases into the Hive mind and gives the order for his Brood to begin the necessary preparations. Once he is ready, they will leave immediately. Next to him, the hydralisk trembles and chirrs again, pleased at the open connection and happy to serve a purpose.

He allows a handful of breems to immerse himself in the collective thought stream, reveling in the sense of wholeness and belongingness. There is nothing peaceful about the Swarm’s consciousness, too full of hunger and violence, and his infested spark echoes the fierce destructive desires of the Hive mind.

It brings to mind a saying used by the Autobot leader. ‘Til all are one.

As a Cybertronian, he had never truly understood as the wording was so vague. Until all are one with _what_?

 “’Til all are one.” He understands perfectly now.

_//Go forth unto the cosmos, my creation. Destroy. Consume. Assimilate. Evolve. We shall_ _be_ …Perfect.//

 -x-x-

Extra Things (because I can never put everything I want into the fic itself):

-The Zergs’ sizes are scaled up here. In the game, everything’s relative to human-size. Keeping that would mean Cybertronians could just step on the Zerg and be done with it. Hard to be afraid of something that small and easily killable.

-The Zerg meant to kill every Cybertronian on the ship. So, why did this poor sucker get infested instead? Because he was dumb enough to separate himself from his group, and the Zerg are opportunistic bastards. They saw a chance to capture him without killing and they took it.

-Why did it take centuries to completely infest him? DNA and CNA are completely different. One’s organic and the other’s not. You can’t just inject DNA into a Cybertronian and expect the DNA to take root. It has to be spliced in, slowly and carefully to reduce any chance of rejection. Both the Zerg and Cybertronians are highly adaptive by nature, which probably helped things along. 

-Whenever psuedo-science doesn’t make sense, it can be explained with one word. Magic. 

-I’ve seen a lot of fics where the Autobots and Decepticons reluctantly band together to fight off the invading forces of the Quintessons. Or Unicron. But mostly Quints. So why not have a much more dangerous threat (that’s not a planet eating planet or whatever he is), one that already wiped the Quints off the face of the, er, universe and have begun to integrate non-organic genetic material? 

-I finally realized that I love world-building way more than I like writing about any particular scenarios. 


End file.
